If you're looking for a stark example of the difference between a corporate giant and a locally owned emporium, just mosey through the carefully stocked aisles of New Concept Video, which serves up practically everything its surrounding community is after: imported fashion magazines, of-the-moment dance-music CDs, and of course an array of offbeat titles -- both new and old, foreign and homegrown. What really makes New Concept shine, however, isn't just the presence of recent highly touted indie flicks that never graced Miami's theaters (Lisa Picard is Famous, Wet Hot American Summer, George Washington, the list sadly goes on), but a redefinition of that very phrase "blockbuster." Don't have Showtime? Still curious about that cable channel's gay telenovela Queer As Folk and its resultant buzz? Forget about hitting your nearest Blockbuster. That chain's Miami outlets dithered for more than two months before finally overcoming prudish moral concerns and deciding to stock tapes of the series' episodes. As for other "controversial" films, such as Bad Lieutenant, Blockbuster demands its very own customized edit before it'll deign to carry the picture. Over at New Concept, however, from its first day of release there was an entire wall of Queer As Folk (on both VHS and DVD), ensuring the type of "always available" rental status that this store's rivals only extend to more hackneyed displays of male bonding such as Pearl Harbor. We'll stick with the shop that keeps its priorities, ahem, straight.

This is junkyard heaven, the place where cool, funky things go to die or to be bought or rented as the case may be. Chandeliers and traffic lights hang from the ceiling while stained-glass windows, Coca-Cola vending machines, marble busts, golf clubs, and bookshelves line the walls. Looking for a life-size bronze boar sculpture with green patina? It's here. A vintage, Jetsons-style Philco Predicta television set from the Fifties? Yep, right over there. A giant Head and Shoulders shampoo display bottle? Check the back. Old gas station signs, telephones, typewriters? Got 'em. Don't know what you're looking for? Give yourself at least an hour to walk through this Smithsonian-scale emporium. If you feel yourself getting tired, plop yourself down in that row of movie-theater seats over by the door.

If Laurenzo's were nothing more than the area's best Italian market (and most people say it is), it would still be worth writing about. But the 50-year-old institution is so much more: a slice of Little Italy in Miami-Dade County, an oasis of Old World charm, a portal onto the past. Laurenzo's isn't just a store. It's a milieu. And it comes with its own soundtrack, piped in direct from the Fifties and featuring a couple of Italian crooners you may have heard before. Where else can you get "Volare" with your veal? "Memories Are Made of This" with your mozzarella? "Sway" with your spaghetti? Ah, Laurenzo's. "That's Amore!"

"From the womb to the tomb and all moments in between." Those are the appropriate times for flowers and plants, according to the ebullient Jenny Kallert, who has run her famous flower shop since 1973. With the fastidious zip of a German-accented bee in pollination mode, she works in her environs making "creations," not mere arrangements. To Jenny, who in 1959 escaped communist East Germany with her family (all of whom were also florists), flowers are not just luxuries to be appreciated on special occasions. They are necessities, as vital to life as air, food, and water. She keeps things intimate by customizing each piece and working only with independently owned greenhouses instead of large-scale flower growers; Jenny's stock includes a variety of tulips, azaleas, orchids, and roses not normally sold at your everyday FTD stand.

Broward has Bob's and we have Worldwide. That's the best way to explain this store's perennial lock on this category. If you're looking for an obscure magazine or an out-of-town newspaper, this is where you must come. And if Worldwide doesn't have it, you're out of luck, bub. Regardless of what you were searching for initially, it's hard to imagine leaving Worldwide empty-handed. Several well-organized aisles offer up everything from the Observer (both London's and New York City's) to more colorful publications such as Paranoia! and Bitch. Best of all is an owner who is not only familiar with virtually every title in his store but the precise day of the week they're set to arrive. Never again will you miss an issue of Asian Cult Cinema.

A cameo to nestle in your cleavage. Rhinestones to ring your fingers. Austrian crystals to drape around your neck. No matter what manner of costume jewelry you seek, you'll most likely find it at this vintage shop, where numerous cases house quality watches, fobs, brooches, chains, chokers, and the like. An added advantage: Since C. Madeleine's accepts items on consignment (by appointment only), you can trade in those pieces that no longer tickle your fancy for some trinkets that do. Chances are you'll discover that one item you've always wished your great-grandmother had the good taste to wear -- and the good sense to pass down to you.